Early wars without UU

I have been struggling lately with early wars as I moved on to immortal difficulty and I was hoping someone might have some useful tips to offer.

I generally have no issue managing early conquests when I play as Rome, Nubia or Persia, all of them civs that come with powerful early UU.

However, my favorite civ to play is France (seeing as I am French myself ) and I realized once I moved on to immortal difficulty that I was really struggling with early wars. If I come across another civ that doesn't have a UU in the ancient or classical era, it usually works fine but I have no idea how to avoid loss and defeat when I spawn near Macedon or Egypt, for instance.
This is especially problematic to me as the last patch and its increase of the settlers' cost has made it somewhat necessary to go to war and conquer some cities early.
I have tried peaceful games where I just spam settlers but I always end up with fewer cities than I would have acquired through conquests and feel it's then hard to catch up with the AI in science or culture.

Can anyone offer some advice on how to best handle that kind of situation ?
Which units should I prioritize in my armies ? Archers or warriors ?
How many units do I need and in which time window (i.e. when do you go to war) ?
What if I don't have iron and no civ will trade it ?

slinger>slinger>slinger. Beeline archery and gold upgrade, use these and your warrior to sack the nearest civ/never lose a war. Sometimes on Deity you can even wipe out 2 or 3 with just 4 archers and a melee unit to actually take the citys. Later just upgrade them to xbows and you have a mid game army now to.

Without a unique unit archers are really your only option. On deity you're facing both a combat difficulty bonus and very early oligarchy so matching up 1 to 1 with melee units won't work, let alone trying to win when outnumbered. Your main hope is having your archers well positioned and winning with superior micro.

Without a unique unit archers are really your only option. On deity you're facing both a combat difficulty bonus and very early oligarchy so matching up 1 to 1 with melee units won't work, let alone trying to win when outnumbered. Your main hope is having your archers well positioned and winning with superior micro.

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That's what I thought but I was under the impression that maybe I wasn't playing the game properly. Thanks for offering your insights guys!

I generally have no issue managing early conquests when I play as Rome, Nubia or Persia, all of them civs that come with powerful early UU.

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Persia doesn't have a strong UU, immortals are meh. Rome is ok, but not as strong as Nubia or Sumeria. In any case, you can (and should) totally rush your enemies on immortal/deity even if you don't have an early game UU.

As others said, build several slingers and quickly upgrade to archers. With this and 1-2 warriors should be enough to repel the early aggression and destroy the invading army your closest neighbor will inevitably throw at you. Use this moment in which they are defenseless to take their closest city. You can usually take 1-2 cities with only some archers and a 1-2 warriors (and maybe a chariot) before they build walls. After they build walls, take whatever's left of that reckless close neighbor (except maybe 1 bad city, to avoid major warmonger penalties for completely eliminating a civ) with chariots + battering ram.

I haven't played at immortal level for a while, I usually only play on deity. On immortal, it might still be viable to focus on archers as others have said. However, on deity I have found that spamming warriors might be the better option because it is easier to take a city early with them.

In my current game I built 3 warriors, sent them to England and while she was distracted attacking a city state, I took London in 2 turns with the 3 warriors. That crippled her for the whole game. After that I built a few slingers and got my archers. Then I built another warrior and upgraded all 5 warriors (4 built and 1 started with) to swordsmen and started conquering any neighbor within range.

Persia doesn't have a strong UU, immortals are meh. Rome is ok, but not as strong as Nubia or Sumeria. In any case, you can (and should) totally rush your enemies on immortal/deity even if you don't have an early game UU.

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I find Sumeria is easier to deal with because Gilgamesh will generally offer friendship early on and then you can get to war with him rather than against him (although it's important to make sure you're the one actually taking cities off other civs, not him).

I find Sumeria is easier to deal with because Gilgamesh will generally offer friendship early on and then you can get to war with him rather than against him (although it's important to make sure you're the one actually taking cities off other civs, not him).

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If Gilgamesh is your closest neighbor he WILL attack you (on Deity before turn 25, I'm not sure about Immortal). The good news is that he doesn't spam war-carts (it would be impossible to stop him if he did), he only builds 2-3 of them and then regular warriors and archers. Anyway, you need to be ready for him.

If you are playing with Sumeria, just spam war-carts and conquer your closest neighbor, maybe even the 2 closest ones. After that, winning the game is a piece of cake.

If Gilgamesh is your closest neighbor he WILL attack you (on Deity before turn 25, I'm not sure about Immortal). The good news is that he doesn't spam war-carts (it would be impossible to stop him if he did), he only builds 2-3 of them and then regular warriors and archers. Anyway, you need to be ready for him.

If you are playing with Sumeria, just spam war-carts and conquer your closest neighbor, maybe even the 2 closest ones. After that, winning the game is a piece of cake.

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Really? I don't play Deity so I had no idea but so far, I've never had Gilgamesh declare war on me, even if he spawned nearby. Instead, he generally asks for a joint war against someone else.
Of course, early conquest is easy when playing as Sumeria, it's playing a civ without an early UU against neighbours that have some that I'm struggling with.

Not having an early UU makes zerg rush even more important. It's a race against the clock. The only two Civs that you can't really zerg rush are Sumeria and Aztec, because they have a powerful UU right from the start.

With those two, you need more strategy mostly involving effective use of archers. Everyone else, I would pump out 3 to 4 warriors and rush them once you have 3 to 4 of those warriors within attack range. Take their capital if possible and they will be screwed.

Not having an early UU makes zerg rush even more important. It's a race against the clock. The only two Civs that you can't really zerg rush are Sumeria and Aztec, because they have a powerful UU right from the start.

With those two, you need more strategy mostly involving effective use of archers. Everyone else, I would pump out 3 to 4 warriors and rush them once you have 3 to 4 of those warriors within attack range. Take their capital if possible and they will be screwed.

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Just to be clear is your initial build is warrior x3-4? Does it matter if you're closest neighbor is 15+ tiles away through rough terrain? I'm going to give this a try some time soon. It makes a lot of sense to me, but it's only viable for a narrow window at the very beginning.

Just to be clear is your initial build is warrior x3-4? Does it matter if you're closest neighbor is 15+ tiles away through rough terrain? I'm going to give this a try some time soon. It makes a lot of sense to me, but it's only viable for a narrow window at the very beginning.

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In my last game, I started as America. Started out moving my warrior to the west and there was a mix of rough and clear terrain. First thing I ran into was Jerusalem. Then a bit farther west was London. Overall, it had to be at least 15 tiles distance. I'll post a screenshot later if I can. I pumped out 3 warriors and rushed all of them west to london. Meanwhile, England's warriors were distracted with threatening Jerusalem. By the time she realized what I was doing it was too late. I captured London in 2 turns with the warriors. Then she started to stream her warriors back from Jerusalem and I was able to pick them off one at a time.

Starting with warriors makes sense for my strategy too because I go for writing first and then go archery after. Thus I might go warrior warrior warrior slinger campus. This allows me to get science going early and get a some of the good early great scientists.

With the exception of Nubia, the early game UUs arent going to be as good as just archer rushing. The UUs may be stronger then archers, but they come later and are offset by the fact that a lot of times they will have walled up, making them weaker. This is why Nubia is stupid for MP, they have a better version of the best unit in the game.

In my last game, I started as America. Started out moving my warrior to the west and there was a mix of rough and clear terrain. First thing I ran into was Jerusalem. Then a bit farther west was London. Overall, it had to be at least 15 tiles distance. I'll post a screenshot later if I can. I pumped out 3 warriors and rushed all of them west to london. Meanwhile, England's warriors were distracted with threatening Jerusalem. By the time she realized what I was doing it was too late. I captured London in 2 turns with the warriors. Then she started to stream her warriors back from Jerusalem and I was able to pick them off one at a time.

Starting with warriors makes sense for my strategy too because I go for writing first and then go archery after. Thus I might go warrior warrior warrior slinger campus. This allows me to get science going early and get a some of the good early great scientists.

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Thanks, I'm going to give this a shot over the weekend. I'm bored with tbe standard slingers-->archers rush and I'm pretty sure my game would be stronger if I got campus or two earlier than I do.

Thanks, I'm going to give this a shot over the weekend. I'm bored with tbe standard slingers-->archers rush and I'm pretty sure my game would be stronger if I got campus or two earlier than I do.

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Ive done control games to test what rushing a campus would, controlling by doing all of the same steps on the same map, same civ ect. I don't remember the exact numbers anymore, but beelining a campus in your cap and chopping one forest was producing 10ish BPT by turn 50. Rushing a settler ASAP meanwhile with no campus and establishing a second city right away and allowing it to grow naturally produced about 8 to 9 BPT, meaning that obviously because of all of the other factors increase that a second city is better then an early campus in the long run because population ultimatly generates most of your science in a typical game. Obviously the archer rush game generated the most science the quickest because of fast populaton grab.

I beleive this discussion has been had in other threads but for maximizing science without war, in the long run you just want early population bases, when you factor in the cost of producing a campus+library, you actually net lose science overall by not instead just focusing on growth. Growth is something you do anyway, and on top of it you get bonus science. Obviously there are diminishing returns for each additional pop in a city, so a wider base is better then going tall.

Im sure someday I will sit down and do some kind of super i depth guide to "starts" including control games for all this junk.

I have played a lot of games where I rushed early settler vs campus and, although I am a firm believer in getting that second city up as fast as possible, I don't think it has to happen immediately as long as you are able to conquer a neighboring city instead. That is the reason for warrior warrior warrior slinger campus. The first 3 units are for conquering at least 1 and possibly 2 cities. The slinger comes in handy defending your capital, though you might also leave one warrior behind for that too. 3 warriors is easily enough to takeat your neighbors capital at the start of the game, unless they are Aztec or Sumeria. Then you will have more of a challenge.

I have played a lot of games where I rushed early settler vs campus and, although I am a firm believer in getting that second city up as fast as possible, I don't think it has to happen immediately as long as you are able to conquer a neighboring city instead. That is the reason for warrior warrior warrior slinger campus. The first 3 units are for conquering at least 1 and possibly 2 cities. The slinger comes in handy defending your capital, though you might also leave one warrior behind for that too. 3 warriors is easily enough to takeat your neighbors capital at the start of the game, unless they are Aztec or Sumeria. Then you will have more of a challenge.

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I was replying specifically to his comment about not slinger rushing and building an early campus. See the quoted post that I was actually replying to, he was stating that he thinks an early campus might be better for overall growth then slinger rushing. I have actually done control games before to test this, showing that this is not the case.

Also going warrior, warrior warrior is extremely inefficient.They aren't as effective at unit on unit combat because they have to take damage to engage in it, as well as to weaken a city. Its better to go triple slinger and beeline archery as outlined over and over again on this site and in this thread. 3 archers+starting warrior, plus 1 or 2 additional archers in the early game can allow you to take out an average of 2~ civs, even on Deity. If they are close enough you may even be able to snag a 3rd before they can wall up. Its all about a straight production conversion. The initial investment of 35p*3+45G*3, along with your starting warrior translates to something I don't feel like doing the math on. Depending on how many turns the game goes obviously, but even conquering the first already built city with some population already more then pays for the initial investment, let alone conquering 6,7 or 8 citys. Not to mention upgrading to xbows later and conquering even more. Compare this to the initial investment of building a settler yourself(80p and one population from your starting city, Im sure you can guess the compounding cost of that over the course of the game), taking the time to move it into position and then growing a city from size 1, it should be obvious that the opportunity cost of even conquering one less city early isn't anywhere near worth prioritizing hard building a settler yourself.

This is an issue for balance reasons obviously. Unless the A.I learns how to defend itself, or some kind of penalty is introduced, or the range on archers is removed or reduced, there is no real cost because its an absolute advantage to just conquer somebody early over self development.

Bonus round:
*units having a "range" is a real problem in terms of output as well, as opposed to melee units. With a melee unit you are always trading damage for damage, even if you are net positive, the units take time to heal, have to get closer and so on and so forth. A ranged unit has 100% damage efficiency(trading damage for zero health) on offence, and still has damage output on defense as well. Not to mention that when you consider a ranged unit can output damage before it can be attacked due to range. In a standard early game scenario when you have an archer versus a warrior and neither are promoted you can have a situation where the archer shoots, the warrior moves and the archer shoots again. The archer has "produced" about 65-80 damage at the cost of zero health while the warrior has produced nothing. If you have two archers with no promotion out of range the warrior is just dead before it can trade any health for damage, which is also its only method of output. As we saw from civ V as well, ranged units naturally produce a severe imbalance as long as they still produce reasonable damage, and as long as melee units are always forced to trade health for damage.

Archers should really be range one or SUPER squishy when they get attacked. I'm thinking maybe Battlecry warriors being strong enough to one-shot them?

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Im not a game designer, but making there range 1, unable to move shoot, making them squishy, unable to damage citys, something. The trick is making it so that they are nerfed but not useless, like most units in the game. Either that or buff melee units. As of right now the only reason to build melee units is to actually capture a zeroed out city.